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Senior Customs Collector Hides Two Jeeps, One Generator at Brookfield

Mr. Malcolm Wilkinson, Senior Customs Collector of the popular Gbalamuya Post, will have to explain how two jeeps and a huge generator found their way to his residence at Brook fields where they have been concealed to prevent the troubling eyes of officials of the National Revenue Authority (NRA). These items were reportedly whisked from their last location passed through the Gbalamuya Post, where Mr. Malcolm Wilkinson is the Senior Customs Collector to his residence.

His excuse to the unsuspecting minds is that the items belonged to his neigbhours whom he is rendering assistance to by making sure that they are safe and well protected.

It is not known when Mr. Malcolm Wilkinson new tax assignment includes keeping and protecting goods from Guinea that went through the borders of Sierra Leone without observing Customs and Excise obligation. It is evidently clear that protocols, proper assessment and evaluation of goods at the Gbalamuya are done for personal benefit and not for the benefit of the State.

According to a senior employee of the NRA Department at the Gbalamuya Post, the money-grabbing appetite of the Senior Customs Collector has opened the gates for smugglers and drug trafficking to Sierra Leone. One of the main sources for drug trafficking to the Sierra Leone, the official explained is through the Gbalamuya Post, where money speaks the language NRA officials can understand and appreciate all the time at the detriment of the state.

The Sierra Leone Police that should be working in harmony with NRA officials have been discouraged and kept at arm’s length from doing their work. The situation that could be described as chaotic is benefitting a handful of NRA officials, whose Senior Collector, Mr. Malcolm Wilkinson is aware of every activity taking place within the environs of the post. Officials from both institutions are at each other’s throat and viewing each other as enemies and not employees of the state” The source concluded.

The Gbalamuya Customs Post, which is the 3rd Revenue Generation Port, is notorious for corruption and activities that are inimical to national development and effective revenue generation. Allegations of fraud, misappropriation, abuse of office and sexual exploitation of minors are daily hobbies practiced by officials. Responding to the allegations, Malcolm Wilkinson admitted the alleged practice of fraud, abuse of office and the sexual exploitation and pleaded with this reporter not to publish, as he put it “We are all brothers and we should help each other as Sierra Leone is a small country”, and went on to explain that most of the NRA Officials posted at the Gbalamuya Post have political backings, therefore to chastise anyone or put in mechanism that would refrain them from illegal practice is like putting one’s job on the firing line.

How true that Mr. Malcolm Wilkinson was assigned to the Gbalamuya Post few months prior to the November 17th Elections to fulfill the financial commitment made by his immediate boss Mr. Santigie Kamara to the opposition remains a serious matter that is begging for investigation.(Read more on the Gbalamuya Post next edition)